Posted:19th Feb 2005I am an absolute rank beginner. I have two hacky sacks on the ends of strings with knots and hairties. After much study of the video clips available here and bits from books elsewhere, and a few attempts, I think I have acheived something that might be a butterfly, and I can keep it up for maybe 30 seconds before the balls hit each other (or my face, or the wall, or my bed, or the ceiling fan, or the table, or the bookcase, or the stack of boxes in the corner, or my clothes hamper.... did I mention I'm trying this in 4'x4' of cleared floor space in a sea of clutter?) and tangle and come untied and fly around the room and get lost. I've only seen poi in person twice. I don't know anyone who does it. There's nowhere in my town to buy them or get training. I've only been trying this and studying it for a couple weeks.

So why the hell was I up at 4am this morning unable to sleep cause I keep having weird dreams about spinning???

Despite total brokeness, I've ordered a fuzzy pair and some videos and a book from HoP, and I swear to god I'm going to lose my mind in the 2 weeks it's going to take them to get here. My room is way too small and full of furniture to do this stuff, and I'm too embarassed to try it in the back yard, there's just chain link fence and the neighbors will think I've started some odd crazy masochistic thing whacking myself with little colored balls. But my fingers ITCH.

What the heck is going on here?? Are aliens beaming loopy messages into my brain or what?!

And whatever it is, it apparently ain't just me!!

I've seen juggling, I've seen staffs and devilsticks and diabolo and ribbons and all manner of various twirly throwy jumpy tricks.... but they're just tricks. Sometimes impressive, sometimes artful, sometimes plain cheesy. I can juggle a little myself, it's not a big deal. As far as I know, nobody-- much less large groups of people-- claim juggling or any of that to be a lifestyle or a sacred philosophy or otherwise all-consuming Jedi mojo. But I've been looking over these boards lately and seeing evidence of a widespread mindset the likes of which is usually only associated with stuff like..... well actually not much comes to mind. Maybe yoga. Or religion.

When I found a video clip, it was one of Nick Woolsey's and as soon as it played I was just GONE. Just blink, like that, my jaw hanging open, tingles crawling up my spine, and my sense of time just vanished. It still happens every single damn time I watch it, instant hypnotism. I knew I'd found something incredible-- and it's not just because I'm a beginner and therefore just easily impressed. Turns out he won an award in COL4, and though there hasn't been a ton of talk about him here, the remarks I've seen about those videos from experienced members exactly echo my own impressions. So I'm not just crazy. Okay I AM crazy, I got the guy's book and despite the aforementioned brokeness I want to fly up there to Vancouver to take his classes next month and there's this tiny gir voice in my head telling me if I don't I'll explode (that happens sometimes!).

I showed a friend of mine (sortof a local guru, one of those fellows who works with 'energy' and just... knows things) that video-- he had absolutely NO clue what poi spinning was at all and I was having a hell of a time explaining, so I just showed him... and within maybe 4 seconds he announced with intruiged authority, "...It's a meditative state."

I'm sure this is a topic that has been discussed before, at length, since it seems to be the essence of the whole activity-- I just thought I'd contribute my impression of it as one just starting out, and ask what is up with all these spinny flappy colored fire glowy circles that THEY'RE EATING MY BRAIN!!

"Ours is not to question The Head; it is enough to revel in the ubiquitous inanity of The Head, the unwanted proximity of The Head, the unrelenting HellPresence of The Head, indeed the very UNYIELDING IRRELEVANCE of The Head!" --Revelation X

Posted:25th Feb 2005 Uh.... thanks? I'm sorry? Um I only did it for 5 seconds! Maybe not even that! No bets on whether I could do it again today. I figured it'd be good to start trying btb right away so I don't get so used to doing stuff in front of myself that I end up having to reprogram to do anything else, that takes 3 times as long. ..And all the books and websites say the poi learning curve is pretty steep at first, didn't know that one was especially hard. I haven't tried forward yet, I bet that's twice as bad.

I live in Bend. That's 5 hours from Ashland and 3.5 or 4 from Portland.... convenient, huh? I don't know what tribe.net is... I'd be happy to know if there are groups in Portland, I do travel there sometimes.

Dammit I was going to give it a rest today but already my fingers got the itch! Argh!! Circles eating my brain!! (It's like 'You've got The Bite!')

(a few minutes later: ) ...So I take the poi bag out of the drawer to take with me later tonight thinking maybe I'll use em... and next thing I know, without even realizing it I'm swinging the damn BAG around by its string! It never ends!

"Ours is not to question The Head; it is enough to revel in the ubiquitous inanity of The Head, the unwanted proximity of The Head, the unrelenting HellPresence of The Head, indeed the very UNYIELDING IRRELEVANCE of The Head!" --Revelation X

Posted:26th Feb 2005The hardest part about learning btb stuff for me was getting into the move... So I started with a forwards weave and I turned around. Actually, that's how I learned the backwards weave in front, too... by starting with a way to start, if that makes sense. I know other people do drills where they start with the poi standing still, but that would just drive me crazy.

Tribe.net is a social networking web site that a lot of US spinners hang out on (because that's where a lot of Burning Man people hang out, and a lot of US spinners are Burners). Anyhow, if you join Tribe, join the Fire tribe, look for me (I'm the guy named Roger that posts all the time) and look through my list of tribes and join any others you might find interesting. PM me there and I can point you to the Portland ppl -- maybe they know some folks closer to you.

Posted:27th Feb 2005There are over 200 tribes on that tribe.net website that have the word 'fire' in their title, so I'm a bit lost as to which one you mean.

Getting into a weave is pretty easy for me, though I can't do it in any creative ways yet, I just start swinging the poi in split time and then bring one hand over-- it's switching both from one side to the other without smacking myself that's really hard.

That said, I must be a freak genetically predestined to weave moves. I can do 3bt btb in either direction now, from one side to the other 5 or 6 times before I mess up.

Just watch, now it'll take me years to do thread the needle, or something odd like that.

And again I've managed to maim myself with the evil pink tribble poi of bubblegummy doom. My right kneecap has a bruise on it that's 4" long, over 1" wide, visibly swollen, and still spreading. I'm limping cause of fuzzy poi. What the heck?? ...Maybe they should have beanbaggy stuff inside, at speed these things really haven't got any give to them.

"Ours is not to question The Head; it is enough to revel in the ubiquitous inanity of The Head, the unwanted proximity of The Head, the unrelenting HellPresence of The Head, indeed the very UNYIELDING IRRELEVANCE of The Head!" --Revelation X

Posted:28th Feb 2005Hee hee this is a good thread cause it describes me too! Blame Bryn he showed me it!!! Got myself some poi on Nov 28th 04 and now am stuck at btb weave hee hee... got btb butterfly and all the other butterfly variations etc... I got the bug big time!!! I too have a smallish space so its hard to practise at home but i stay for about half an hour after my kung fu sessions and practise.. and get many an admiring glance hee hee!

Posted:1st Mar 2005dude. slow down. faster you spin more it hurts. turn on some tunes and just chill out with the poi.

If you're working on butterfly moves, it helps to move your hands up and down a little bit - down when the poi and down, up when the poi are up. This also helps to keep the two poi synchronized. Don't cross the hands - when they cross it gets harder. I had trouble learning butterfly for MONTHS, and then I saw someone doing them with their hands moving up and down and BAM, I got it.